Routine growth of cell lines in medium supplemented with milk instead of serum

Several cell lines can be grown in media, supplemented with milk instead of serum. To obtain a good plating efficiency the medium containing milk must be supplemented with calf serum at a final concentration of 0.5%. The milk must be centrifuged before use to get rid of the fat and cellular debris. Using these precautions several monolayer cell lines can be grown routinely in milk supplemented media, just as well as in serum supplemented media. The economic advantages of using milk instead of serum are considerable.